CURLY GIRL RUNS: Yoga made for ‘every body’

Trained in teaching Yoga for Round Bodies, Brenda Woolner offers “gentle yoga for everybody” in small classes at her Dartmouth home and at the Yoga Co-op in Halifax. (TED PRITCHARD / Staff)

Brenda Woolner remembers the moment she knew that people of all sizes should be welcomed into yoga classes.

It was last summer and the Dartmouth woman was taking a Yoga for Round Bodies teacher training course in Ontario. Woolner was listening to a panel of participants who recalled experiences of exclusion and humiliation at regular yoga classes.

“They told incredible stories about going to a yoga class and feeling very put off by the teacher, feeling not welcome in the space, feeling looked at because they didn’t fit,” says Woolner.

“One woman spoke about being shamed by the yoga teacher. The teacher basically said, ‘Sorry, what I have to offer isn’t for you.’ … That woman took that seriously and stayed away from yoga for years. To me, that’s incredibly heartbreaking.

“As a social worker, I have a big heart anyway and it really got me and I thought, ‘Oh my goodness we need to open this up.’”

She has done just that.

Woolner, who offers small classes from her home, has also started teaching Yoga for Round Bodies at the Yoga Co-op in Halifax.

The round body concept was founded by Tiina Veer of Toronto as a way to “create safe, comfortable and enjoyable experiences for bigger-bodied people,” according to Veer’s website.

Yoga for Round Bodies has recently taken off after women’s clothing store Addition Elle offered free classes in select stores across the country. Woolner taught at one such class in Halifax.

The classes look pretty much like any other yoga class, especially a restorative yoga class, except that props, such as yoga blocks and straps, are basically a given.

“(A round body) often needs support,” Woolner explains. “You can’t move your body in certain ways. Sometimes you just don’t have the strength to do it, initially anyway. Props aren’t seen as a negative thing at all, they are just part of the process.”

Modifications help participants achieve success and everyone is cautioned to go at their own pace.

“It’s not to prove anything to anybody. It’s not prove anything to yourself,” says Woolner. “It’s giving your body a safe place to be, an accepted place to be.”

It is a misconception that overweight people do not want to be active, she says. Often it is a matter of not having access to a supportive environment.

“It touches me that (yoga) makes such a powerful difference for people and how they feel in the class but also how they feel outside of the class. It makes them more aware of making other healthy changes, too. It has a bit of a domino effect.”

And while going to class might spur participants to go further and make other healthy changes, Yoga For Round Bodies is not about losing weight.

“It’s not weight loss focused at all,” says Woolner. “Some people may be on that path for themselves, but it’s not an expectation that you’re here because you want to lose weight. We have a health for every body philosophy.”

Anyone who identifies themselves as a round body is welcome in her classes, says Woolner who, at size 14, considers herself a round body.

“I’m on the edge, I guess.”

As for the lady who spoke so passionately in Ontario last summer, she has found a welcoming environment in which to pursue her practice.

“For years, she really wanted to go but strongly felt from that interaction (at the regular yoga class) that she didn’t belong in yoga,” says Woolner. “But she found her way back and is very grateful.”